by N H Paxton
“Is good work, no?” I gave him a half smile.
All of the crafters in here were capable, if not formidable. This man, he was a professional. Of all the people who performed their tasks within the workshop, second perhaps to Forge, this man was one I wanted to impress.
“Yeah, it’s a good ’un. Ye did this?” He set the missile head down very gently on the top of his workstation and hopped off his stool.
“Vlad takes work very seriously. Should be better than good.” I raised an eyebrow, and he responded in kind.
“Fine, fine, ye got me. It is quite good. But ye know wot?” He tapped a knuckle on the missile head. I cringed, expecting it to explode. It didn’t.
“It’s inert, Vlady. Ye didn’t do it right. Come now, what did ye leave oot?” Reif tilted his head while looking at the object, his eyes roving over the finished product.
“Am waiting.” I tapped my foot on the stone floor impatiently, expecting him to say something imperious.
“Actually, I cannae find anythin’ wrong with ’er.” He scrunched his forehead as he stared hard.
“If has no problem, why didn’t explode?” Now I was confused, which was not something I normally felt.
“Eh, no idea. Could be that there’s jist not enough of somethin’.” He lifted the head again, turning it around a few times in his hands.
He flipped it over and looked at the inside of the dome, then smiled.
“There she is.” He brought it over to me to look at, pointing his finger at one spot inside the dome that shed light.
“Oh, chisel cut too deep.” I frowned, my brow creasing. It would appear as though I was not careful enough. That would also explain why I didn’t receive any XP for finishing the project.
“Yep, that’ll do ’er. Aside from that, my boy, ye’ve done well. Especially since yer not even an Enchanter. That class o’ yers, it’s a right proper doozie.”
“But can be fixed and adjusted, yes? Make happen.” I nodded, my arms folded over my chest. I had made an error, and I hated admitting to failure.
On the other hand, failure led to breakthroughs in the most wondrous ways.
“Yeah, yeah, we’ll git to workin’ on ’em. How many would ye be wantin, then? And how soon, would ye say? We’ve got a bit o’ work to be doin’ beforehand.” He glanced behind him, where his workstation was covered in bits of paper, notes, and spreadsheets.
“Crimson Alliance will need hundreds, if not thousands, for defending walls of Rowanheath. Make work quickly. Fighting is only getting worse, Vlad hears. Affix heads to ballistae bolts, ship to Rowanheath. Also, be to making careful, da? Are highly explosive.” I raised an eyebrow again, which wasn’t returned.
Reif looked down at the floor, not in shame, but in thought.
“Yeah, we kin make that work. Alright, me an’ me boys will git to workin’ on ’em, posthaste like. And as fer the precautions, we’ll take ’em good and proper. Thanks fer this, Vlady. Ye did us a solid here.” He clasped my wrist for a handshake and turned to his corner of the workshop, shouting at his crew.
I had already turned away before he could get too riled up. The man was often known to get rather zealous about his work.
I returned to my workstation, kneeled down, and retrieved a leather gauntlet I had picked up while doing some trading at the armory. It was simple, unadorned, and had no rare or great qualities to it. It was exactly what I needed to make my next project a reality.
Hollow Tip, Hollow Point, Hollow Heart
THE SUN HAD SET AN hour ago, yet still I worked on. Most of the crafters within the workshop had left quite some time ago, and yet I trudged forward. The tinker in me continued to fight with the tension on the string, while the crafter within demanded I leave the tension as it was and move on to another portion of the project. The perfectionist simply denied them both and carried on with the situation at hand. I did need to hurry, though. The countdown clock was running on my quest to make the Guild Banner.
“Gods-damned stupid piece of shit wooden trundle collapsed binding broken string piece of cow brain.” The string of words that left my mouth, in the irritating broken English I was forced into speaking, sounded awful even in my own head.
But these were the lows I was brought to with the Hidden Compartment Folding Crossbow Gauntlet. Yeah, that would need a better name.
I had used four different types of string during my brief, yet endless, fight with the crossbow. All of them had failed. I used several different types of wood for the body and limbs. None of them were right. I had torn the leather gauntlet more than once and sewed it back together. My stitching looked like something you would see on a defenestration victim.
Everything with this weapon was falling apart. The entire concept of the thing had since left my mind, and I was struggling. Vlad, the genius weapons engineer, was struggling with medieval technology. It was absolutely laughable. What would the people of Almaz-Antev think if they saw me now?
“Would say Vlad is not thinking outside box.” I rolled my eyes as I answered my own question. “Vlad does not follow blueprints, makes new ones.” I set down my tools and watched as the tension in the crossbow string released, hurtling it across the workshop, where it plinked harmlessly against a wooden chair.
“Need to think for a moment.” I pulled out a cigarette from my inventory and lit it with a quick flare from Purifying Fire, taking a hard drag from it as it burned. The smoke filled my lungs, like a fog rolling in on a troubled lake. It pressed against the inside of my chest, comforting and relaxing.
I held my breath for just a moment before blowing the smoke out of my nose, letting it curl about my head like the exhaust from a dragon. I watched as a little green square popped up in the corner of my vision, denoting that I had received a buff from the herbs I’d laced the cigarette with.
<<<>>>
Buff Added
Elves’ Thread: The Elves of Eldgard, widely known and with a vast populace, are amongst the most intellectual and wise creatures in the land. The secret lies within this herb, cultivated and strengthened to improve the mind and soul.
Elves’ Burning Knowledge: Smoking this herb grants you +5 Intelligence and +5 Spirit; Duration: 30 minutes.
<<<>>>
Already I could feel my mind racing, reaching for the next tidbit of information I needed to make this tool a reality. I could build the entire thing, then Miniaturize it with my Engineering ability. Or I could craft all the pieces separately, then fuse them together. Or I could use something stronger than the wires and strings I had been using.
My eyes wandered over to the row of jars that were filled with Spider’s Silk, just waiting for use in something like this. On Earth, the orb weaver spider was capable of spinning a silk that was stronger than the same thickness of steel. Perhaps those characteristics had carried over. This was, of course, without even considering the stretchiness of the material.
“Vlad is idiot. Spider’s Silk is way to go.”
I flew into action, unscrewing the lid and fetching a long portion of silk. I worked it between my fingers, rolling it tightly into a thin rope. I wanted to test it out before I actually applied tension to it. I adhered one end of the webbing to the top of my workstation and the other to a large ingot of Darkshard Metal I had in my inventory.
With the precision that is innate to all engineers, I unceremoniously shoved the ingot off the edge of the workstation. I watched it fall in slow motion, then reach the end of the tether. The silk stretched, but not excessively, then rebounded, reaching a height that was unexpected. It was easily more than the entire distance it fell, signifying that the rebound had somehow gained energy.
I watched it bounce up and down for a moment or two, then come to a rest. The silk had not lost any length, nor gained any. It had withstood the entire experiment unchanged.
“Okay, Vlad is impressed. Now, to make work for crossbow bolt.”
Taking the string tension out of the question, everything else was a simple build. Th
e smaller pieces made it a bit more difficult to put together, but it worked the same as any other crossbow. Body, limbs, trigger mechanism, escapement for the wire, foot for the bolt, channel to keep the bolt flying straight.
I made a slight modification to the channel for the bolt by rifling the interior of the channel. It would cause the bolt to spin in the air and provide more accuracy. I was planning on using this weapon as a last-ditch defense—accuracy was key.
The project was completed within minutes after I figured out the wire material. The biggest issue now was to make sure it folded and locked against the underside of the gauntlet. I used the crossbow’s trigger and escapement as a tension pull in reverse for the wire, preventing it from slipping off the limbs while stowed.
The limbs were fitted in such a way that they would be able to pivot backwards at their joining, so they would fold nicely while being stored. A catch was built into the top of the crossbow channel to prevent the bolt from slipping or falling out while stowed, and the entire body was built in three pieces that snapped into one another, like a telescoping wand or a self-defense baton from Earth.
“Needs to be easily triggered from palm, but not to shoot self in foot.”
I studied the entire thing for a moment. I wanted an unnatural motion to cause the trigger to pop, but not so unusual that I wouldn’t remember how to do it in an emergency situation. I ruminated on the subject before seeing a baby spiderling crawl across the ceiling of the workshop.
“How would spider spin web if was man...?”
The answer was somewhere in that idea. I had seen something when I was a child, a cartoon or television show at some point about a man who was also a spider. What was it called? Man-Spider? No, it was definitely Arachne-Hero. No, those were all wrong.
The name was unimportant, but the way he spun webs was all-important. He used a flick of his wrist, with a pressing of the middle and ring fingers into his palm. But how could I get the gauntlet to recognize that?
“Individual pressure plates? No, too complicated.”
I was talking to myself again, one of my terrible habits from Earth. Though it did help me to focus on what I was doing, I hated the sound of my own voice here in Eldgard. The broken English and the fact that my voice itself remained completely unchanged, even though I had changed entirely, upset me. This was supposed to be a fresh start, but everything about me reminded me of Earth Vlad.
I shook my head as I got caught up in the idea of how little had changed. The environment had changed, yes, but I was still Vlad Nardoir, the weapons engineer from Earth. I was still building weapons and explosives for people who used them to kill others. I narrowed my eyes as I slapped a hand, palm down, on the workstation top.
“No, time for reflection later. Work now!” I needed to stop focusing on the past, there was nothing there for me any longer.
Earth was gone, my old life was gone, and this was all that remained. And it was endless. I put myself back to work, knowing that it would calm me as though I were meditating. Now, where was I? Yes, the pressure plates idea was a good one, but it needed to be more specific. If I only had two, it would trigger any time I closed my fist. I would need inverted plates, like an And/Or gate.
“Bah, making And/Or gate from old tech, impossible.” I frowned as I plopped down onto the stool I rarely used. But what if it wasn’t impossible?
I pulled together a few of the tension wires I had cut from steel cabling earlier and affixed some small square pieces of scrap metal to them. After lining them up in parallel, I started to work on them.
I would need four, and the outer two would have to be inverted. That is to say, they would need to negate the entire thing if they were triggered. The only way I could think to do it without actual technological components was to over-tense the cables when they were pressed.
About halfway down the index and middle finger cables, I twisted them together, with the index finger cable being bound tightly around the middle. I did the same with the pinkie and ring finger cables. I didn’t know if this was going to be a working endeavor, but not gained, not challenged. Wait, was that the right adage?
“Maybe need English adage lessons from Jack...”
I sighed heavily as I carefully threaded the wiring through the layers of the leather gauntlet, moving them toward the opening I had cut, and stitched, several times. The wires seemed to have lost their way in the leather, but finally appeared. I made sure to keep them separate before attaching the entire thing to the crossbow, which was neatly folded into itself.
It resembled a slightly awkward box with a string. It was about the length of my index finger. I was hesitant to permanently affix the crossbow to the gauntlet for fear of needing to redo the wiring but overcame that when I realized I had already permanently affixed it. Oops.
“Eh, if doesn’t work, will make new.”
I shrugged to myself, not caring terribly. It was time to test my new toy. I slid the gauntlet onto my hand, then tightened it with the cross-ties on the top. The fingerless design left a great deal to be desired, especially with my job class. I didn’t favor losing fingers to acid or poison or having them crushed inside a device.
Then again, a small layer of leather wasn’t going to protect my fingers from being smashed. These were the dangers of being me.
I squeezed my fist shut, and nothing happened. I mimicked the hand motion I had seen Spider-Man—that was his name!—do, and the crossbow snapped into place, the string immediately twanging.
The sensation of another project complete was most excellent. The downside was that the crossbow limbs overextended and snapped. I would need to fix that later.
Now I just needed to make bolts that were small enough and light enough to be used with it. And for that, I had just the plan in mind.
“Will be hollow, like bullet on Earth. Small, lightweight, carries poison. Perhaps hollow tip as well?”
I drummed my fingertips on the workstation top, letting the rhythm drown the sound of my headache that had been hiding somewhere in the back of the tension. I looked at the quest notification in my journal to check the time.
I had spent five hours working on these ridiculous tools, not actually working on the quest. I only had fifty-five hours left. It seemed like a great deal of time, but it surely wasn’t.
“Necht, will have threaded tip. Puncturing head, micro-vessels inside metal, carries poison into blood. Is probably evil, definitely prohibited by Geneva Convention, like triangular bayonet, but is not Earth.”
A wicked smile found its way onto my face as I slapped a piece of clean drafting paper onto the workstation. I immediately developed three different formats of the bolt: one with a completely hollow body for carrying a large payload of liquid, a second with a glass vial on the inside that would rupture on impact, carrying the payload up into the tip using kinetic force, and a third that would carry a series of three small vials inside.
These vials would carry independently inert liquids which, when forced together, would react with explosive force. The downside to each of these bolts was the manufacturing time, and the liquids and poisons they would need to be filled with.
Poisons, potions, lotions, explosions! The words reverberated inside my skull as I grabbed a crossbow bolt from the pouch at my hip. Gamma, my Living Weapon, a sentient crossbow with a taste for destruction and chaos, rested on an empty space of workstation nearby. It was an incredible piece of machining I was loath to ever be apart from. We had a telepathic connection; it was confusing.
“Oh, Gamma, is good to be awake. How does schematic look?”
I held up the paper, asking a living weapon what it thought of something I had made. It was like having a child, which I never had the joy of experiencing on Earth.
Destroy! chimed his voice in my head.
Of course he wanted to destroy things. Gamma’s insatiable appetite for destruction was about the only thing he constantly experienced.
“Okay, will destroy later. Have plans for morn
ing. Must finish project though.”
I nodded to myself more than Gamma and put the paper back on the workstation. I worked the head off the crossbow bolt with a pair of pliers I had built that were unusual.
They had a cutting edge as well as the standard gripping head. I had also added wire cutters to the inside of the neck so they resembled pliers that were more like the ones I had used on Earth. The things I had to improvise here. I shrugged as I pressed forward.
I looked down the shaft of the bolt and noticed it wasn’t completely straight, but that was something that could be dealt with later. I just really needed to know if this was going to work.
Tapping into my skill set as an Alchemic Weaponeer, I activated Reconstruction, which allowed me to take simple objects and change them to my desired format. They couldn’t change beyond the scope and extent of their original materials, but I wasn’t planning on making a spear out of a bolt.
I envisioned the bolt being hollow, about half the size, and thinner, letting my Spirit flow out of me as the change took hold. The wood the bolt was made of shifted and changed. It glowed with a soft light for just a moment before an audible snap came from it. The light faded, and what remained was exactly what I was after. Except it was completely hollow, all the way through to the other side. B’lyad.
“Good thing bolts are cheap.”
I sighed as I took another crack at it, this time envisioning that the bolt had an end on it. As before, the slight tug of Spirit flowing from me heralded a change, followed by the same snap as before. This time the change was exactly what I wanted. No error. The bolt was hollow except for the end, which was sealed.
I studied it for a moment before setting it down and trying it again with the second format of bolt. I would have to manually manufacture the glass internals or at least Reconstruct a glass vial into one, but it would be something I could think about as I worked out the space issues inside the bolt.
I removed the head from another bolt and repeated the process, this time envisioning there was a hollow small enough for an ampule of poison or potion or whatever. At the last minute, before triggering Reconstruction, I had a thought. What if I cut the bolts in half, drilled out the interiors, and then resealed them? Would that be an easier prospect? I was working my brain, trying to save time anywhere I could.