CH 83

Chapter 83 – Rinko’s Lesson

“The reason why the development of guns and firearms has been stagnant in this world is due to a number of factors, such as the preconception that magic is too basic and the prejudice against technical jobs due to class differences… First of all, it is difficult to secure sulfur. There are no volcanoes in the empire or in neighboring countries, and it is not imported in constant quantities. The intellectuals have no scientific knowledge, so it was a challenge just to explain what it is. And saltpeter, well, that’s hopeless.”

“…Huh.”

Rinko’s explanation of gunnery began abruptly, but since she spoke so quickly and spoke of unknown information as if it were a standard topic, the Casemaian (with the half exception of the Dwarves, who are technical workers) were staring blankly at the list of unintelligible words.

On a wooden board behind Rinko, a recipe for black powder, its quantity, and manufacturing method are scribbled in the empire’s official language, and the Dwarves nod in agreement as they take notes.

They seem to understand the story there, which scares me.

“In the end, I managed to get a little bit of sulfur after appeasing the merchants who came and went, and finally threatening them, and after being hassled several times. In the end, I managed to get a little bit of it after getting a few bad ones. I refined the glass stone by myself. That’s how I got the nickname “toilet bug”! I thought about killing those idiots and putting them out in the saltpeter fields!”

With nearly 30,000 corpses, it might be possible, I suppose. But I won’t do it.

I don’t know if it is possible to make black gunpowder now…

“More importantly, Rinko, was that mortar a failure? Or is it on the operational side?”

At Heimann-jiisan’s question, Rinko frowned in blatant displeasure.

“It’s because of the stupidity of the Imperial Army. I don’t want them to blame me for that. The reaction speed of black powder is too fast. It’s called detonation, and in essence, it’s an explosion. It’s fine for exploding the shell itself, but it’s unsuitable as a fuel. So I made up a different recipe called brown powder.”

“Brown powder?”

The Beastman tilted their head, the Elves were puzzled, and the Dwarves’ eyes lit up.

“Do not burn it until it turns into black charcoal, but stop it in its brownish state. It burns slower, so accidents are less likely to occur, and even with a long barrel, the bullet body can be properly accelerated to the end… It was supposed to be like that.”

“Supposed to?”

“They threw it away. I had the trouble of preparing it, but they unilaterally informed me that they would not use brown powder.”

The Dwarves tilt their heads at Rinko, who stomps on the ground in frustration.

“What’s the reason?”

“I don’t know, but the technical officers of the Imperial Army have made the decision. They are the top nobility, and no matter how much the lower ranks try to convince them, they will never be convinced. They probably thought that faster combustion = more power. That’s because black powder pops more spectacularly when you look at combustion tests of individual materials. It is not like making a carriage horse dash at full speed all the time. There is a performance that suits the purpose. Really, there are only idiots in the Imperial Army.”

The Beastman, who are not familiar with Rinko’s complaints, exchanged glances with each other. Either they don’t get it at all, or they don’t care to figure it out. Yadar, who seems to have been the latter, shakes her head at Rinko.

“No, I don’t think there are any “in the Imperial Kingdom,” who knows about what you did, or maybe not even in Casemaian.”

“No, it’s not true, see? All the Dwarves seem to understand pretty well, even Yoshua, you know what I mean, right?”

“…Well, sort of.”

“Geez, even if it’s only vaguely, I know about it, you know? Even though you’re Yoshua, you don’t get it.”

“Hey, wait a minute, Yadar, you don’t think I’m an idiot, do you?”

“Dwarves can understand most of it. It’s not a “black powder,” but everyone who wants to make magic tools for combat, especially magic accelerators, has had similar experiences.”

As Myrril says this, a smile spreads across Rinko’s face. This fellow is probably close to the Dwarves.

Heimann-jiisan, who had been taking notes on this and that, asked as if suddenly remembering.

“Why is that mortar cannon operating in such a strange way again? It was as if they were using it knowing it would break.”

“That’s right. You shoved a stupidly large amount of black powder into it and launched it boom, boom, boom, didn’t you? If a defective gun made of bronze filled with impurities and poured into a sand mold is fired without any space between shots and without cleaning the barrel, it is bound to break down. Even they know that, right?”

“As expected. They’re beyond help.”

“I told them over and over again, “If it breaks, just bring a spare.” They’re really idiots!”

“Well, you’d have to be more careful if you were handling a human, but if you give it to a golem, no one will die if the barrel blows up.”

“I wish they were dead.”

Rinko is chagrined and spits it out indignantly. She must have been really angry.

Even I was annoyed to hear that they had summoned her without her consent, treated her like an incompetent person, and even disrespected the results she had finally achieved, and then took them away from her.

“I see, so Rinko is planning to complete that cannon in Casemaian, is she?”

“No, not at all?”

“”””Eh!!!””””

Rinko tilted her head with a scowling face, and this time the Dwarves froze.

“When we have machine guns, mortars, and T-55s, it would be a waste of time, effort, and materials to upgrade from front-loaded to rear-loaded guns, you know? For example, that technology is hundreds of years old in our world.”

Heimann-jiisan and Caretta-jiisan look at me to see if it is true. I wonder when they changed to smokeless gunpowder… Well, it was over a hundred years ago.

“…That may be true, though. There are some unique improvements, developments, and new technological advancements that are being pursued.”

“What good would it do if the result was smokeless powder or an intercontinental ballistic missile or, for short, ICBM? It’s not that I wanted to be an artilleryman or a technical officer. I just wanted to live freely without the interference of the stupid empire’s nobility, so I sold off what little knowledge and experience I had.”

“Aishibi-em?”

It’s hard to explain where Myrril can really get into it, and I don’t want her to be interested in that. More than that, though, I’m a little curious about something.

“Wait a minute, Rinko. Knowledge is good, but the experience is…”

“I once blew up an unpleasant teacher’s minicar…”

“You’re a total terrorist!”

Well, now I have “Terrorist” in the job title section of my status. I don’t remember if Rinko’s had it either.

“In this world… at least in the empire, science and chemistry are terribly behind because of the overdevelopment of magic technology. It’s like indifference, or in a way, like the mysticism and theistic worldview of the world I was from. Chemical reactions and natural phenomena are all explained by “external magic,” “internal magic,” and “magic formula.” They stop thinking about anyone who does anything out of the ordinary by labeling them as demons or monsters, which is an abominable foreign object.”

“Hmm. Even the Dwarves feel this. Especially mages look down on engineers.”

“Medicine is not very good either, but since healing magic is not universal and practitioners are too rare, primitive medicine and pharmacy are still popular among the common people. Hygiene is not so bad either, as it seems to be related to the fastidiousness of the Elves or the people summoned. Baths are also quite common, aren’t they?”

“Well, yes. We don’t have much trouble finding water and fuel.”

“In the empire, there are idiots who say that taking a bath is a sign of incompetence in using purification magic, and only such people have bad body odor. It’s the worst…”

I understand that there seemed to be a lot of resentment, but the Casemaian people only understood half of Rinko’s comments. Both Dwarves and Elves are trying to understand the main idea from the context while somehow replacing it with their own area of expertise. When it comes to the Beastman, almost 100% of them don’t understand the slightest bit.

I’m not much different.

At any rate, let Rinko help us develop technology in areas other than guns and firearms. Yeah.